Nest Doorbell will no longer ring on Google Echo Device

[tdmromany]

We were having problems getting the wired Nest doorbell ring the mechanical chimes already installed in our house, so we bought a Google Echo. It worked for quite a while but suddenly stopped ringing on the Echo. I thought at first it was because the nest account wasn't associated to a gmail account, but I have merged it to this email and it still doesn't work. I have done all the troubleshooting steps that I have found: ensured it was connected to wifi, ensured the chime function was turned on in the nest app. Echo is plugged in and functional. Any other suggestions? 

I'm not sure if it is a gen 2. It was installed when we moved here 6 years ago. There have been so many ongoing issues with this doorbell, I am very tempted to switch to Ring, which I used at my other house. Any help would be appreciate. TIA. 

[MplsCustomer · Accepted solution]

@tdmromany 

If you've had your doorbell for 6 years, then you have a 1st gen Google Nest Hello Doorbell. (We have 3 of them.)

By "Google Echo" I think you mean the Google Nest Mini. If you actually have an Amazon Echo, see this Help topic: https://support.google.com/googlenest/answer/9325080

To get a doorbell ring and announcement on a Nest Mini, you need to turn on "Visitor announcements" (https://support.google.com/googlenest/answer/7672451)for your doorbell in the Google Nest app, and your Nest Mini needs to be in the same Google Nest "home/structure" as your doorbell.

If "Visitor announcements" is turned on and it WAS working previously, one possibility is that the small internal battery in your Nest Hello has failed. This is a common problem; it's failed in all 3 of our Nest Hellos. The internal battery is only used to power your doorbell during the instant when power needs to be diverted to ring your indoor doorbell chime when the doorbell button is pressed. When it fails, your doorbell goes offline for a minute whenever the doorbell button is pressed and no notifications are sent.

There is a workaround. If you turn off the "Indoor chime" option, the doorbell no longer diverts power to ring your indoor doorbell chime and the doorbell stays online. We've done that with all 3 of our Nest Hellos and rely instead on "Visitor announcements" to sent notifications to our Nest Hubs and Nest Mini.

In your case, if your indoor doorbell chime was already not working and you were relying on "Visitor announcements" to your Nest Mini (or Amazon Echo), you could try turning OFF the "Indoor chime" option. If your issue is caused by a failing internal battery, this should keep your doorbell online and your "Visitor announcements" should resume.